Homemakers Get Help Entering Job Market

DAYTONA BEACH — Divorce, separation, death or illness of a spouse will qualify a homemaker for a free secretarial training program at Daytona Beach Community College.

STENO, or Secretarial Training and Employment for New Opportunities, seeks to help displaced homemakers find new skills and jobs. It is aimed at Volusia and Flagler County residents who have been unemployed 15 of the last 26 weeks.

No income limits are required. Participants study in an intense 12-week program Monday through Thursday, for half of each day. Once the course work is complete, jobs are sought for the participants either as employees or on-the- job trainees.

''What we tried to do was come up with a program to match the federal dollars for a need that we see all the time,'' said Susan Lofaro, DBCC's Special Programs director.

Lofaro said she tried a version of the program several years ago when she noticed an increasing number of women seeking to re-enter the job market. But most of those women couldn't afford the luxury of taking semester-long courses nor could they always afford the cost of those courses, she said.

Lofaro presented a recycled, shorter version to the state Department of Labor and received a $500,000 grant to offer STENO free for two years on a trial basis.

''I couldn't believe it. I thought it was a dream come true. At the time I didn't really know how I was going to pay for my education,'' said 25-year-old Kimberly Davis. The Daytona Beach resident recently completed her course work and is now a secretary at Ace Electric Supply Co.

Similar to most of the women in her class, Davis said her self-esteem was low and she had no idea what the working world would be like. Her childhood dream had been to marry and take care of the house after graduating from high school.

When Davis' marriage ended in divorce six years later, she turned to the only other career she had ever remotely considered -- becoming a secretary. Her DBCC coursework proved easier than she initially thought but Davis said she was luckier than some of her colleagues because she at least knew the basics of typing.

In addition to typing, STENO teaches students word processing, business English, office calculation and dictaphone skills at a self-paced rate.

So far, the program's progress has been about average, said Larry Miklus of the state Department of Labor in Tallahassee. But, he added, he is optimistic the program will meet its goal to serve 250 displaced homemakers by June 1987. Other areas of the state have adopted programs similar to STENO since it started in May 1984, said Miklus.

Lofaro said she targeted secretarial skills because state projections call for a large increase of jobs in that area. The state Department of Labor estimates that by 1995, clerical jobs in Florida will experience a 45 percent increase, third only to professional and service positions.

For Davis, the STENO course has started her thinking about going back to school for even more advanced courses. Meanwhile, she has been telling her friends about STENO and urging them to sign up.